


Fevers and Family Bonds

by AnotherNamelessGhoul



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Good Parent Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, M/M, Sickfic, Young Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:40:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22984933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnotherNamelessGhoul/pseuds/AnotherNamelessGhoul
Summary: On their way to Kaer Morhen, Ciri gets sick and then takes Jaskier down with her. Geralt is out of his element.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 16
Kudos: 238





	1. Chapter 1

Somewhere halfway to Kaer Morhen, Ciri had fallen ill. It had started in much the same way he'd come to know when something wasn't right with Jaskier: a deep, pervasive silence had fallen over them. She was never as chatty as the bard, but she and Jaskier had gotten to be good friends and they never really ran out of conversation. The stilling of it had been alarming. They'd stopped and set up camp and no sooner had they settled down she spiked a fever, miserable and restless, tossing and turning on her bed roll until Geralt scooped her up and let her tremble against him. She'd woken up from some kind of nightmare as their fire died down around midnight, thrashing against him wild-eyed and then without turning or moving away, vomited up the broth that he'd coaxed into her earlier in the evening. The rest of the night had gone that way, with Ciri being passed between Geralt and Jaskier as the other rinsed clothing out in the nearby river, wet rags to try and wipe her face and cool her down with, brewed tea that her body kept rejecting. She'd not complained during the whole ordeal, just been stone-silent and clung to whoever's arms she ended up in. By the morning the three of them were exhausted to the end of their wits.

"Humans," Geralt said, exasperated, as Ciri finally fell into a doze, wedged between the two of them on the one bedroll that was still clean. "Always thought a monster would take me down, but the lot of you will be the death of me from worry, wait and see." 

Jaskier didn't answer, and when Geralt glanced over, he was already asleep, still sitting up with his head lolled against his chest and his breathing coming out in little constricted snores. Geralt put an arm behind his back and leveraged him down until he was laying flat and then lay down himself, not intending to sleep but at least hoping to rest. 

The next thing he knew was Jaskier's voice. "It's alright, darling mine," he said, and Geralt opened his eyes to see Jaskier pressing a weepy Ciri into his chest. " Just a bit under the weather, hm?" He looked almost as exhausted, wan and pale as he offered a small, sad smile. "The poor thing," he mouthed over Ciri's head, and Geralt nodded. 

"Would be glad for Yen right now. She'd know exactly what to do." He pressed a hand to the exposed back of Ciri's neck and found it far warmer than he would have liked. "Try some more tea, Ciri," he told her, and she shook her head without looking up.

"Even if you're sick again, it'll be less miserable than just dry retching, love," Jaskier coaxed, and she pulled her flushed face from his chest with some reluctance. The illness had made her look far younger than her years, fragile. "Just a bit of a bug," he said as much to Geralt and himself as he did to Ciri, "nothing we've not managed before." 

"Yen, or Vesimir. Someone who knows more than me." He ran his calloused fingers through Ciri's hair and across her scalp, comforting. 

"Stop your fretting. Everything will be fine and we'll be back on the road in a day or two. You worry too much." 

"Are you alright, Jaskier? You seem-"

"Tired. Very tired. Haven't had a rest in days, properly. When this all blows over I think we'll all have a very long sleep."

He looked more than tired. He looked half run into the ground. Geralt decided not to comment further.

They got Ciri to drink half of a cup of tea and then they dozed again, even though it was scarcely past midday. Geralt was woken this time by Jaskier mumbling something sleep-addled and pitching to the side away from him and Ciri. He snapped away and upright and Geralt could see the glaze over the blues of his eyes. Geralt reached out and brushed the sweat-soaked locks of hair from his face, pressed a hand to his forehead. "Jaskier? You're burning." He mumbled, slightly panicked, looking down over the bard.

"Fuck," Jaskier sighed, and closed his eyes again.


	2. Chapter 2

"Up you get love, come on," Jaskier said, recognizing the way that Ciri swallowed convulsively and curled tighter around her middle. "Just away from the bed roll, please. That's it. You're alright." His hands were shaking with fatigue and chills but he made to hide it from her. 

Geralt moved in and swept her hair away from her face, gathering it up and holding it back. "Jaskier, I can take over. You should be resting."

"I'll be alright. It's worse for Ciri because she's small, and isn't everything more drastic when you're that age?" 

"Hm." He knew Jaskier's tendency to run himself into the ground without even realizing he was doing so. "Lay down anyways."

Jaskier didn't put up much of a fight, just lay down half on the bed roll and half on the cold, damp grass so that there'd be room for Geralt and Ciri. 

"Really miserable, hm?" Geralt asked when Ciri finally sat back, and she nodded and didn't so much lay against his chest as fall headlong into him. 

"Is Jaskier okay?" She mumbled, voice small and still edging on tears.

Geralt never heard her weepy even after all that she'd gone through and it rattled him. He'd barely any idea what to do with a sick child and even less what to do for a crying one. Fatherhood, if that was what he was to call it, had been an entire series of trial and error that scared him more than any of the monsters he faced did. He finally settled on "He'll be alright and so will you," and wrapping his broad arms around her waif-thin frame. 

"Did I get him sick?" 

"Just a product of being on the road, sometimes. Nobody's fault." That Jaskier had spiked a fever after staying up to care for Ciri surely linked the illness back to her, but that wasn't knowledge that she needed to have. 

"Feeling any better?" He asked, to change the subject. 

"No." She muttered, petulant, grumpy. He supposed she had the right to a bit of attitude. It was less disconcerting than silent, clinging Ciri at any rate. 

"'No' meaning you're going to imminently puke again? Because I'd prefer you release your hold of me first." 

She made a sound that might have been a scoff or a little laugh. Geralt hoped for the latter. 

"Think I'm good."

"Good." 

From the bed roll, Jaskier shifted restlessly, rose, gave some sort of gesture that presumably meant that he'd be returning shortly and shuffled to the line of trees bordering the camp. Ciri eyed him, worriedly, pulling away from Geralt.

"He's alright." Geralt assured her. He figured Jaskier had been afflicted with the same stomach upset that had been plaguing Ciri and he'd not wanted to worry her or, worse, set her off to being sick again. "If need be I'll go tend to him. You don't need to worry yourself." It was useless. She'd already lost too many people not to worry about the ones she had and the platitudes just bounced off. But she was also exhausted and weakened by fever, so it was easy enough to get her to lie down while he stoked the fire and readied water for another round of tea.

He was getting ready to make sure that Jaskier hadn't keeled over somewhere at the edge of the woods when he saw the bard coming back, dragging his feet, nearly tripping on snags and roots in the underbrush. He gracelessly slid down next to Ciri. She stirred from her not-quite-sleep and sat to look at him.

"Are you alright?" She asked, reaching out to him. He snagged her hand and held it in his own. 

"Just fine, darling."

"Hmmm." It was such a close approximation of Geralt that Jaskier had to laugh.

"Look what you've done to her!"

Geralt smirked, yellow eyes flashing in the fire light. He thrust a cup of tea into each of their hands. "Drink up, both of you." 

Ciri made a face into her cup. Jaskier started to do the same, thought better of it and held his out, toast style. "To our health!" He called, and Ciri giggled and settled in to sip at her tea with no complaints.

When they'd finished, Geralt shepherded them back to the bedroll, letting Ciri sleep in his arms and Jaskier sleep pressed up against them so they were in more of a pile than anything else.

"In for another long night, do you think?" Geralt murdered after Ciri's breathing had evened out into the slow cadence of sleep.

"Unfortunately," Jaskier sighed, and burrowed in closer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to keep writing shameless domestic fluff until I die and y'all are stuck along for the ride


	3. Chapter 3

"Jaskier," Ciri mumbled, "you're too hot." She pressed away from him, kicking at the blankets that Geralt had tugged over them, struggling into the cool evening air. Jaskier, meanwhile, had fallen back asleep and he shivered with chills despite the burning of his skin. Ciri scrambled out of Geralt's arms and tossed herself into the grass, pressing her cheek against the cold evening dew and sprawling herself out against it. 

"None of that," Geralt said, lifting her up like she weighed nothing. 

"But it's so hot," she said. The over-large shirt of Jaskier's that she'd borrowed was stuck to her skin with sweat, as was her hair, and Geralt brushed it away and pressed a palm to her forehead. 

"Stay there a moment," he said, sitting her down gently next to Jaskier, who mumbled something and reached for her in his sleep. Geralt walked down to the river and dampened cloth that they'd made from a torn-up shirt some time ago. He ran it across her flushed cheeks and then spread it out across the back of her neck. She sighed in relief and he caught her before she could fall asleep sitting up.

He wished he could get her to keep down something for the fever but he also felt it cruel to wake her for another cup of tea that she'd be heaving up into the bushes before it had a chance to do any good. He felt helpless, doubly so because Jaskier was the one who was good with being tender and comforting and now he was sick too. Geralt liked problems with concrete solutions: you have a monster, you cut the head off. You have a wound and you bandage it up. You have an ill and emotionally scarred child in the middle of the woods... what then? He eased her out of his arms back onto the bed roll.

"How are you faring?" He asked Jaskier, who had thrashed himself awake again and gone to sit closer to the fire. The flickering of the dying embers further washed out his ghost-pale face and made him look almost skeletal. 

"I'm alright," he said, with as much artificial cheer as he could force into his voice. After a second he crumpled under the weight of Geralt's stare and shrugged. "Felt sick again, figured I may as well sit up for a bit. How's Ciri?"

"Feverish and miserable. I think we might set out for a healer come light. For the both of you."

Jaskier shrugged and didn't protest, which was a testament to how poorly he felt. "She's just so small and she's had it so tough. I worry."

Geralt glanced over to the sleeping form of Ciri one last time and then sat down next to Jaskier. 

"You're doing fine, you know," Jaskier said, in that eerie way that he had of reading Geralt's mind. He curled up to rest his chin on his knees, like he was too tired to hold himself upright, but he kept talking. "You love her and she knows it. That's the most important part. Everything else falls into place after."

"Hmm." 

They'd been playing some long game of chicken, or so it felt; that was, they'd both pushed back any physical affection, despite having travelled together for years and despite having slept in the same bed for necessity sake many a time. But now Jaskier let himself not-so-subtley drop against Geralt's shoulders and Geralt sat stone-still until Jaskier had settled his weight. Geralt wasn't sure what to do with himself, with any of it, so he reached up to stroke through Jaskier's hair under the guise of checking his fever and Jaskier leaned into the cool touch. 

"Dad!" Ciri cried out from the camp, her voice harsh and broken with fear, and both of them were up like a shot in a second, at her side. Her eyes were wide and wild but she looked right through them, still seeing whatever fever-dream her brain had dredged up. She gave a broken little cry and called out again. "Dad, help!"

He'd never heard her call him dad before, never anything but Geralt. It gave him a pang of emotion in his chest that he couldn't quite place. "We're here, Ciri." He said firmly. He took one hand and Jaskier took the other and after a second realization trickled back in and she clenched their hands back and let go another hitching sob. 

"Geralt! Jaskier!" She still trembled violently and they both pulled her in at once, sandwiching her between them. 

"Just a dream, love, just a dream." Jaskier said, voice muffled by the closeness. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I'm sorry." Was all she said. She held tighter.

"Nobody will make you." Geralt said. He pulled back as Ciri wriggled for space, somewhat calmer and trying to swipe away tears. "Tomorrow we'll find a town. We'll get you both feeling better. It will be alright." Jaskier's eyes met him over Ciri and there was something there that Geralt couldn't explain but that made him feel warm inside. Later, when everything calmed down, he would think more about what it meant that in Ciri's fever dream she'd called out for a father and they'd both come running. For now, they all needed sleep in the worst kind of way.


End file.
